OTRC: Morrissey, former lead singer of The Smiths, explains his royal wedding radio rant

Morrissey is not a fan of the newly married Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge.

The former lead singer of The Smiths and songwriter told BBC Radio host Dermot O'Leary on the eve of last week's royal wedding, "I couldn't take any of that seriously at all. I don't think the so-called Royal Family speak for England now and I don't think England needs them. I do seriously believe they are benefit scroungers, nothing else."

He added, "I don't believe they serve any purpose whatsoever. I'm not an anarchist but I believe that people don't want the Royal Family. The so-called royal family. They're not royal to me. But they're royal to the media for some reason."

According to BBC America blog, the singer recently apologized in a statement to a fansite for being in a "foul mood" during the interview.

"I'm sorry I made the Detergent O Leary [sic] radio interview so difficult but I was in a foul mood, having spent a full week surrounded by the royal dreading," the singer wrote.

"During the week of the royal dreading, Poly Styrene died. Having made an enormous contribution to British art and sound -- at a desperate time when so many of us needed her, Poly Styrene's death was all but ignored by the British television news media," he added, "who instead rained hours and hours of blubbering praise onto Kate Middleton -- a woman about whom nothing is known on a personal level."

The singer recently released "The Very Best Of Morrissey," a collection of greatest hit and videos on CD and DVD. According to Entertainment Weekly, he has taken swipes at the royal family in the past in a 1986 Smiths album "The Queen is Dead."

The magazine reports that he allegedly referred to Prince Charles in the lyric "I said Charles, don't you ever crave / To appear on the front of the Daily Mail / Dressed in your mother's bridal veil?"